This report is a precursor to the Lufthansa flight I took from Munich to London.

This flight was operated by Air Dolomiti as a regional route for Lufthansa. The equipment was an Embraer 195 jet that could seat 120 passengers in a flexible configuration.

Intra-European business class isn't an experience I would pay a premium for and Lufthansa's excellent fares to London did not extend to business class. I've always had great experiences on Embraer's E-jets in the US so I looked forward to this regional jet.

Online Check-in

I booked an Economy Light fare so I checked in 23-hours prior to departure in order to guarantee my seat assignment. The 2-2 configuration meant no middle seats and I had a 9-hour layover in Munich so I wasn't too concerned with where I sat.

The online process was fast and easy. I decided to check my bag for roughly $27- about the same as checking a bag with a US carrier.

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Cluj Airport:

I got to the airport at 3:30 AM for my 5:55 departure to Munich. I was greeted by this:

No one showed up until close to 4:00 AM- just under 2 hours before departure. Since I was the first person there, I was the first person in line.

The process took 5 minutes. I then proceeded to the security check. That was also cleared within 5 minutes. I arrived at the gate area and was amused to find that Cluj Airport had a lounge accessible to quite a few different members- but only after 5:00 AM. Since boarding started at 5:20, there was no point and I didn’t get a chance to check out the lounge.

Boarding:

Cluj Airport has only 3 gates. All 3 gates had flights departing within minutes of each other. As such, all announcements were made at about the same time and it was a mess trying to figure out the lines for each flight. I found the one for my flight and made my way through pretty quickly.

Cluj also has no jetways. The plane was parked at a remote stand and we were bussed to the plane.

It was cold. Very cold. I was glad I didn’t have to walk out to the plane, but I was not a huge fan of the bus boarding system. It left a lot to be desired. Of course, once off the bus, most people ran for a set of stairs without knowing where exactly in the plane they were. This led to some people at the back of the boarding from the front stairs and some people boarding at the back of the plane were in the middle which led to some delays.

On-Board

These were slimline seats. Oof. They had zero padding and were hugely uncomfortable. I found my seat: 9F.

However, I appreciated the legroom when compared to some US carriers.

We settled in, went through the safety briefing in 3 languages- German, English, and Romanian- before making our way

Soon thereafter, flight attendants came around offering little refreshing towels.

For a 6 A.M. flight– and that too a short one– I was surprised by that service.

However, once we took off it was a different story. 5 minutes after takeoff, the seatbelt was turned off. After that, 10 minutes….15 minutes….eventually 30 minutes had passed since we took off and there was no sign of a beverage or snack service. I decided to doze off. When I woke up, just prior to landing, I noticed some of my fellow passengers had refreshments and cookies so I imagine there was a service, it just seemed to be too slow for a morning flight.

The overall flight length was 1 hour and 30 minutes.

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Overall

What can I say? Regional jet. Regional carrier. Short flight. Early morning. There wasn’t anything exceptional. There wasn’t anything worthy of remembering on this flight.

I wish I had gotten a chance to interact with the flight attendants and try the service, but for a 6 AM flight the service was far too slow.

Once we got to Munich, we were bussed to the terminal and I set off out of the airport to explore the city.